Explain transaction propagation in Spring Boot
Reported in Criteo European engineering loops. Framework internals question common in backend interviews.
Interview scenario
Context for Criteo candidates:
What do REQUIRED, REQUIRES_NEW, and MANDATORY mean in Spring transactions?
Model answer
Try answering aloud first
Cover trade-offs, structure, and a concrete example before revealing the baseline response.
How to frame this at Criteo: Connect your answer to measurable impact, clarity of thought, and trade-offs the team cares about. Below is a strong baseline response you can adapt with your own project examples.
REQUIRED joins an existing transaction if present, otherwise creates a new one; it is default and suits most service methods. REQUIRES_NEW always starts an independent transaction, suspending the outer one.
MANDATORY requires an existing transaction and throws if none exists, useful for enforcing transactional call contracts. Mention proxy-based behavior: annotations on internal self-calls may not trigger transaction interception.
In interviews, connect propagation choice to business needs such as audit logs that should commit even when main workflow fails.
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